The first vaccines against the rapidly spreading monkeypox disease are due to arrive in Ireland on Friday.
The first 1,400 doses of the modified Vaccinia Ankara, marketed under the name Jynneos, are expected to arrive here in the afternoon, part of a joint order of about 110,000 doses by the European Union.
So far 54 cases of monkeypox infection have been detected in Ireland as of July 13th, according to the Health Protection Surveillance Centre, part of a global outbreak that reached 10,000 cases this week.
In the last week, the number of detected monkeypox cases in the European Union rose by 50 per cent to reach 6,000.
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European Commissioner for health and food safety Stella Kyriakides said this was a “cause for serious concern for public health. The first deliveries of monkeypox vaccines are today arriving in Ireland with 1,400 doses to protect citizens and respond to this outbreak.
Doses have already been delivered to the countries with the largest outbreaks, including Spain, Germany, Portugal and Belgium and are due to arrive in Italy also.
“More deliveries will come in the coming weeks,” Ms Kyriakides said.
The rapid spread of the disease has caused a scramble for the vaccines that protect against it.
Ireland’s National Immunisation Advisory Committee has advised that health workers treating people with the infection and the close contacts of confirmed cases should be offered a vaccine.
There is no medicine to treat monkeypox. Symptoms include an itchy rash, fever, headache, muscle aches, backache, swollen lymph nodes, chills and exhaustion and most people recover within a few weeks.
The disease is caused by infection with monkeypox virus, which is found in some animal populations in remote parts of central and west Africa. In the past, the virus has caused occasional limited outbreaks in travellers and local communities, but in the last few months cases have spread across multiple countries.
